Swansea desalination plant ranked third in world

The Swansea desalination project was ranked third in the world among 26 projects that went on line during 2013, by the Global Water Intelligence magazine during a ceremony held in Paris, France in April.

Comment

By BILL HALL

southcoasttoday.com

By BILL HALL

Posted Apr. 28, 2014 at 12:01 AM

By BILL HALL

Posted Apr. 28, 2014 at 12:01 AM

First in State

The first public system like it in the state, the desalination plant was recognized by Global Water Intelligence magazine in a April ceremony in Paris.

Withdraws 4 million gallons of wat...

» Read more

X

First in State

The first public system like it in the state, the desalination plant was recognized by Global Water Intelligence magazine in a April ceremony in Paris.

Withdraws 4 million gallons of water from the Palmer River during two daily cycles at 5,400 gallons a minute

Raw water is pretreated with membrane filtration, followed by reverse osmosis, producing 1.2 million gallons of drinking water

2.8 million gallons of reject water is returned to the river at 3,700 gallons a minute

Salt water from the Palmer River is taken in at low tide when salinity levels are low, treated for drinking water with discharges at high tide

SWANSEA — The Swansea desalination project was ranked third in the world among 26 projects that went on line during 2013, by the Global Water Intelligence magazine during a ceremony held in Paris, France in April.

"It was like the academy awards," said Water Superintendent Robert Marquis who represented the organization at the conference and awards ceremony. "The project that took first was in Israel and is the largest in the world built by a company that has 400 plants world wide."

"It was an amazing experience," Marquis said. "I was able to get a lot out of it, meeting with equipment vendors from all over."

He noted that he learned that rather than sole source procurement, he was able to learn more about other available materials as replacement parts which could save on maintenance costs in the future.

Marquis noted that there were over 40 countries represented.

"The pavilion where it was held was opulent," he said. "The event lasted three days."

The first two places were announced, Israel and Dubai, and it was not learned until later that Swansea was third, Marquis said.

"It was a big event," he said. "We had the president of Liberia there and a lot of other dignitaries who talked about water resources in the world. There is conflict in the world due to water."

It was noted in the literature from the Global Water Intelligence magazine that the Swansea plant combines technical accomplishment and environmental sensitivity out of all proportion to its size. Energy costs are minimized by withdrawing water during two daily low-tide periods when the river's salinity is at its lowest, and the plant's SCADA systems are programmed to discharge brine concentrate at high tide. Because the raw water intake system was constructed in protected salt water marshes, special care had to be taken to satisfy environmental requirements.

"A lot of the projects were dealing with industry, not public water supplies," Marquis said.